Chapter Seven
Fate approached the supermarket in his usual style. Irony had recently commented that he had a dull posture when walking. The words rang round his head leaving him slightly self conscious. He didn’t even know what a dull posture looked like never mind correct it. Irony didn’t either. Her only intention had been to make Fate self conscious when he walked.
Fate put his concerns to one side. He had to be professional and focus all his thoughts on Penelope Herbert. She had to be stalled during her weekly shop by three minutes and eight seconds. The knock on effects of the delay would leave Brick and Spiritwind immune to the beam that the Jefferians planned to use to freeze time on Earth. He still wasn’t entirely sure how he would stall her.
Checking the time he increased his pace, skipping across the car park and making it to the revolving doors with plenty of time to spare.
Fate had done his research and knew Ms Herbert liked to have a fully stocked drinks cabinet at home. The idea of leaving the house for a night out sober just didn’t seem appropriate. He also knew the purchase of alcohol signalled the end of her shop, meaning as long as her trolley remained drinks free he had time on his side.
Strolling through the supermarket, trying to lighten his posture with various shimmies and twitches, Fate spotted Ms Herbert perusing the cereals. Visually rifling through her goods he could see nothing constituting booze. This was good. It gave him at least eight more aisles to finalise his plan, which so far consisted of approaching Ms Herbert and seeing what came out of his mouth.
Fate took a deep breath and relaxed. “This is all going very well.” He thought. “I have both time and the upper hand. I’m used to neither such luxury.” Knowing there was only one direction she would be heading in, Fate strolled ahead and waited near a selection of olive oils.
Glancing at the shelf, the concept took a step back to assess the vast array of oil on offer. It all looked the same except for the style of writing and shape of bottle. Picking up a glass container that was trying desperately to be a Roman urn, he toyed with the air bubble inside, making it do laps of the handles. Fate drifted off into his mind, lost in the curious liquid. He could have stayed staring indefinitely had his phone not interrupted him. The awful tune combined with the sudden vibration of his leg, made the concept panic. As he reached to his pocket, to make the sound stop, he realised he’d released his grip on the bottle. He looked down just in time to see one piece of glass separating into thousands. Fate answered his phone as the liquid glooped around his shoes. Fortunately it wasn’t Irony. Unfortunately it was his girlfriend Karma.
“Hello my sweet pumpkin of love. How are you on this wonderful day?” Fate sensed trouble instantly. She was being too nice.
“Oh I’m fine. No complaints here.” This was a lie. His head ached, the ridiculous bandage had begun to fall loose, a sixteen year old lad with a mop and bucket was giving him the evil eye, and Penelope had just walked past, moving within six aisles of completing her shop.
“So you’re feeling happy with yourself then?” The click of the loaded question became accentuated by the sweetness of her voice.
“I thought I was.” In truth Fate was far from happy. His actual emotion awaited classification. It was the feeling ‘normally I’d love to but right now I can’t so please don’t take my apparent lack of interest as being indicative of a bigger problem or lack of feelings, it is merely the situation that prevents me from acting the way I wish I could. And I’m definitely not in a mood that requires lots of questioning about why I’m in a mood that I’m not actually in’. It currently sat as a sub branch of awkwardness, and was displayed facially with a softening of the eyes and a smile through clenched teeth. Karma couldn’t see the expression. She continued oblivious.
“Even with that bump on your head?” The tone changed.
“Ah! The bump.”
“Yes. The bump. How did it happen again?” It was clear from the tone she knew exactly how it happened, not that she would admit it. Fate would have to explain it.
Karma loved her job. The swings from life changing generosity to outright vengeance suited her transient personality to perfection. Unfortunately for Fate it made their relationship something of a minefield.
“I was…..I just…..careless I guess.” Fate squirmed out an answer whilst keeping one eye on Ms Herbert. She’d skipped through the cleaning products and was only two aisles away from the drinks.
“You’re not normally careless dear. You’re usually very good at seeing things coming, with it being your job and all.” The sarcasm hid behind a thin layer of annoyed delight.
“I know. I was quite shocked by the whole thing.”
“And you can’t think of any reason why it might have happened?” She persisted with an air of knowing. Fate would have picked up on it had he not been focused on Penelope and her speed through the oral hygiene products.
“Just bad luck I guess.” Luck was merely a pseudonym Fate worked under to achieve goals without logic. To utter such a phrase made it clear to Karma he wasn’t paying attention. She scrapped all subtlety and showed her hand.
“So you weren’t ogling a pretty girl?” Fate panicked as Ms Herbert missed out the last aisle all together and went straight for the drinks. His subconscious had picked up on Karma’s comment; unfortunately it couldn’t get a word in as Fate committed relationship hari-kari.
“Okay dear I will; got to go. The woman I’m after is getting her vodka.” He put the phone down and leapt forward towards Ms Herbert. His subconscious attracted his attention and revealed what it had been working out. Karma had caused his head injury for looking at a girl. As the realisation struck home, Karma’s retribution for following a woman around a supermarket arrived in the shape of a shopping trolley dissecting his path; as Fate flipped through the air he had time to curse his girlfriend’s misunderstanding of the situation. He had no such option to speak upon landing as all breath vacated his body as it thudded on the tiled floor with the grace of a captured fish. He stared up at the fluorescent lighting wondering how his simple plan had gone so wrong so quickly.
Even Fate’s bland face couldn’t deflect the attention he began receiving. If smashing the bottle hadn’t made him stand out, his attempts to scramble over the upside down shopping trolley brought everyone’s gaze upon him. A sea of tuts and shaking heads accompanied his efforts to turn the trolley over and replace the goods that littered the floor. With his mind still on Penelope he dropped the shopping in the wheeled basket, apologised and turned to leave. The apology was greeted with a shrug and look of disbelief. Within twenty seconds Fate had blended back into obscurity, even with an ever loosening bandage and a limp.
Turning the corner to the drinks aisle, Fate still awaited inspiration as to how he could delay Ms Herbert for three minutes and eight seconds. A few ideas flitted through his head, but their flaws were quickly discovered and they were asked to move on. Beginning to enter Penelope’s social space, Fate noticed his hand reaching for a bottle of wine from the shelf. His subconscious was good at this kind of thing. He handed all responsibility over to it and sat back to see what it would do.
Ms Herbert turned to face the out of breath man. The sound of two bottles delicately clinking together had alerted her to somebody’s presence; Fate’s removal of the wine from the shelf had not been clean. Before she could question him he flicked the bandage from his eyes and started his speech.
“Good morning, afternoon.” It hadn’t started as smoothly as hoped. “I was wondering if you’d be interested in taking part in a wine tasting trial we’re running in this store today?” Eight seconds had waved goodbye.
Ms Herbert felt suspicious about the whole thing and expressed such with a frown and a raise of the eyes. “Which wine?”
“Why this wine here. The wine I am holding…..the wine called….” Fate tried a subtle glance for the wines name. All the words merged into one in his panic. It quickly became a blatant search for information. “…..Red Beauty
. The wine from down under that will have you saying ‘My. What a Red Beauty.’ It’s very good.” Fate’s attempt at a grin wiped out any credibility his pitch may have had. Fortunately for him, Penelope wasn’t easily scared by weird men in supermarkets. If anything she was intrigued by them, especially when it looked like they may give her free wine.
“Shouldn’t you have a little stall or something?”
Fate’s improvisation skills leapt in to overdrive. “Market research has shown that a stall creates a barrier, a sense of mistrust between us and you the customer. We at Red Beauty wish to smash down such obstacles to you becoming our client, or Red Beauty friend as we prefer to say.” He tried again with the grin. It was clearly time to drop it.
“So where are the glasses?”
“It is not for us at Red Beauty to impose drinking snobbery on our friends. Our extensive questionnaires have shown the average person enjoys their wine straight from the bottle, and we at Red Beauty consider ourselves to be just like the average person, only with far more money.” A full minute had passed and Fate felt he could improvise for hours. If it wasn’t for the bandage slowly falling back across his right eye he’d have said it was going perfectly. He tried to blow it away between sentences.
“So you want me to swig from the bottle?” Ms Herbert cut through the jargon.
“We at Red Beauty want you, our friend, to drink our product in the way you feel most comfortable. Our research has shown most people feel most comfortable swigging straight from the bottle.”
“Do you only have that one bottle?” Penelope’s suspicions returned.
“Not at all; we have the whole shelf to choose from. We feel the drink we offer to test should be the drink you can buy. Many of our rival companies use a completely different drink when offering taste tests. To let you in on a little trade secret, many of our rivals actually use Red Beauty as their samples because they, like us, know it’s the best wine around.” The grin returned without warning.
“Go on then. You can’t turn down free wine.”
“Excellent choice madam.” Fate raised the bottle to hand it over, at which point he noticed the cork. Without a corkscrew the whole charade could come crashing down. Improvisation stepped in once more. “Did I mention the snacks promotion we’re running alongside our fine wine offer?” Fate scoured the shelves opposite, searching for anything he could tie in with the wine.
“No, you didn’t.” Ms Herbert didn’t care if it was genuine anymore. She found Fate thoroughly entertaining.
“Well I should have. We’re also testing…..Cheese Heaven: the only cheese snack that transports your taste buds to paradise. Heaven and Beauty, a combination even the God’s can’t argue with.” A packet of Cheese Heaven quickly occupied his hand. He struggled to open the packet with the wine still in his grasp. He managed it as two minutes passed. “Smell the aroma as it attacks your senses. How can you defend yourself against the lure of such cheese utopia?” He wafted the bag across her face. Ms Herbert followed the opening with her nose.
A disgruntled teenager, mop still in hand from the oil incident, had been watching Fate. As an employee of the store he felt it his duty to inform somebody of the odd fellow. The security guard he had told was delighted at finally having something to do. He arrived at the aisle with the cheese dance in full flow.
“I think I’ll be fine with what I’ve got actually.” Ms Herbert gestured the bottle of vodka to Fate as she realised she was dancing round the supermarket with a packet of crisps. The sight of the security guard peering around the corner of the shelf also raised her suspicions once more. She only hoped she wasn’t being filmed for a prank related show of some sort. Fate still had thirty seconds to kill when the security guard interjected.
“Excuse me sir. I’ll have to ask you not to do that.”
“Do what?” Fate kept one eye on Ms Herbert whilst turning to face the guard. Unfortunately the eye he focused on her had a bandage in front of it. The continuous puffs of air he aimed at it did nothing to help his claims of normality. Penelope had already decided she was going nowhere. If somebody was about to get punched she wanted to see it.
“Manhandle the merchandise before a purchase has taken place.” The guard stepped up his authority level.
“Manhandle is a little sinister don’t you think. I only wished to share the delights of Cheese Heaven with this young lady.” Twenty seconds remained.
“I don’t think the young lady is interested sir. Are you madam?” A wink of superiority and a smirk trickled from the young guard.
“No. Not now I know there’s no free wine on offer.”
Three minutes and eight seconds fast approached. Fate had to make a swift exit to allow Penelope to continue with her new destiny. “My mistake; I’ll leave quietly.”
“Now I….You will?” The guard had been looking forward to a bit of a struggle.
“Of course; come on. No time to waste.” Fate marched off ahead as the guard tried to catch up. He was determined to see Fate off the premises even if he had to jog slightly to do so. Ms Herbert put the whole affair behind her and headed to the checkout. By the time she’d placed her shopping on the conveyor belt all she could remember about Fate was his bandage.
Fate remained outside, peering through the window at intervals. The guard stared out the front of the shop in a purposeful manner. He tried to look as though he was in the midst of a big case. In truth he was thinking about the cheese and tomato sandwich he had in his locker. He hoped the tomato’s juices hadn’t seeped into the bread leaving it too soggy to enjoy. Fate continued to pop up at the window as Ms Herbert joined the queue at the newspaper stand. He went over his calculations and checked his watch. Things had gone exactly to plan, only one more thing to check before he could head to Fut’s house for a relaxing night in. If this final bit went wrong he’d be up all night trying to fix it.
Penelope finally reached the front of the queue and bought her weekly lottery scratch card. Heading to the door she placed her shopping on the floor and paused to reveal the symbols. Fate continued to peer through the window. The security guard had lost all interest in everything and pivoted on one foot whilst staring at the ceiling. Ms Herbert looked at the card, looked around, then looked back at the card. She covered her mouth to prevent a cheeky squeal from emerging before returning to the queue. Fate relaxed. He could head to Fut’s and allow human nature to do the rest.
By delaying Ms Herbert Fate had ensured she joined the queue for the scratch card in a winning position, one hundred pounds to be exact. This meant she could now afford to go to the Flashin’ Passion night club tonight with her friends, a night with far reaching consequences.
For Penelope it meant she would be barred from the establishment and thus unable to meet Barry Butternut the following week. Barry would have eventually ruined her life. For Craig Kirtley, the drink Penelope spills on his new shirt will allow him to firmly grasp the idea that some things just don’t matter. This realisation would enable him to accept himself and all his flaws and go on to a live a far more fulfilled existence, and to become the undisputed king of self help authorship with his book: Life is Only a Stained Shirt, and Stains Wash Out’, but perhaps the most important consequence of the night, unless you are Jack Steel who is now found alive yet thirsty in the Australian outback rather than as a pile of bones, concerns two unassuming young men going about their daily business. Without Penelope Herbert’s good fortune the Earth would have faced an alien invasion without two heroes to stand in their way. Although when the Earth realises who the heroes are it may wish she hadn’t bothered.
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